As a logistical point, you may frequently see additional comments in the body of posts. I will comment within posts as "NDT," and Rick will as "RF".
Well, it’s that time of the year again. With the new year just around the corner, it’s the perfect time for us all to set goals and make plans for the future.It’s also a good time to take a look back over the last twelve months; to re-evaluate our problems and celebrate our accomplishments.
For myself, this has been a really good year with a lot of personal and professional goals fulfilled. I won’t bore everyone with all the details, (No body else really cares that I managed to potty train my daughter or that I finally got to go to Disney Land this year.) but for the sake of this post, I’d just like to share some of the martial arts related stuff.
In June, I started to blog about some of my training experiences, as well as, ideas about martial arts and combat sports on a site called kicksboxes. I had no idea what I was doing or how much I’d gotten myself into when I started.
Luckily, while researching other martial arts blogs (to see what others where doing) I came across Nathan’s TDA Training and the Convocation of Combat Arts Forum. Through the forum, I became exposed to a variety of martial artists and their blogs. I learned a lot both about the combat arts and blogging from visiting their sites.
My own blog improved and I found my ideas starting to take shape as I began posting more frequently. Things were actually going quite well for about 6 months. Then in November, I hit a bit of a snag.
As a martial artist, I practice traditional karate and kyusho-jitsu (pressure point fighting) with kata application. But as a kick boxer, I enjoy the freestyle element of combat sports.
I found that my site soon developed a bit of a split personality as I found myself writing about sport training methods in one post, while appealing to traditional methods in another.
Although my goal had been to reconcile these two approaches toward training, I found that the posts tended to skip quickly between styles in a confusing sort of manner.
What I really needed was another outlet where I could discuss combat methods and ideas, while still being able to focus on the controversial principles of traditional martial arts, kata application and pressure point fighting on the kicksboxes blog.
Unlike some traditional martial artists, I love mixed martial arts and kickboxing competition. I’m very interested in ‘reality’ and ’scenario based’ training. I like the modern, progressive arts like Jeet Kune Do and Systema. I also happen to think it’s important to learn about and compare the different approaches to training and fighting.
I just needed somewhere to express these thoughts without complicating the original purpose of the kicksboxes site.
Luckily, Nathan recently e-mailed me with an offer that turned out to be the perfect solution to this problem. He asked if I would be willing to co-author on the TDA Training blog.
Of course, I was honored because I consider his blog to be one of the very best on the internet. Naturally, I accepted.
At the beginning of 2007, I hardly knew what a ‘blog’ was. Now I find myself a member of one of the best martial arts blogs around. I consider my blogging experience this year to be an overwhelming success!
As for my blogging resolutions for the new year… I hope to pop-in every week or so to add training ideas or comment on one of Nathan’s posts. I’ll try my best to maintain the high caliber of content that readers expect at TDA Training.
I will also post more (hopefully) focused material at kicksboxes.blogspot.com.
Anyway, that’s who I am and why I’m here. Check back again soon for a review of a new book/dvd product that’s sure to help many people successfully tackle another popular resolution… getting back into shape.
Best wishes for training in the New Year!
Respectfully,
Rick
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